Steorn's perpetual motion claims are extraordinary. They've raised millions from investors, and 2007 is the year that this will all change the world or Steorn will fall apart. Which will it be? Find out here first.

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Here are some of the quotes that I pulled out of the Engadget Interview of Sean McCarthy, CEO of Steorn, if you didn't have three hours to read the whole thing:

Engadget: Do you have a statistic or number of what you estimate the energy efficiency level of your machine is? Is it 110% or 150%?

Sean McCarthy: It varies from configuration to configuration. I think the largest efficiency that we would have physically measured would be about 485%. These numbers can be misleading. For example we might be getting 485% per joule, which means were getting 4.85 J out, but there could be a configuration that's could be delivering 130% efficiency yet delivering 10 joules. So, the technology itself is pretty well researched in terms of punch line efficiency it's 485%, but that wouldn't be the optimum output of the system. Obviously we're more focused on direct power output of a device than the punchline numbers. 485 to 1 is 4.85, but we could easily say, 10 to 12 joules off of a system is going to have a lower punch line efficiency. And power output is obviously the key factor, energy output is obviously the key factor.

Sean's response to the demo setup:

"But with respects to what happened, we brought three systems to us from Dublin, three component systems, we don't move them in their operational way, we stripped them down. They are very, very simple and there is not huge configuration to them, but they are very sensitive configurations because there are lots of magnetic loads and so on. We got one of the systems working on the Tuesday night which was the Tuesday before we were going live on Wednesday evening."

Sean implies that the units had been built and possibly tested in Dublin before the demo. Up until now, we only heard about the three days the engineers had in London to get the demo working.

Sean's feelings on Dr. Mike's report:

"I can't possibly criticize Doctor Mike for what he said. It's exactly what I would have said, I probably would have been harsher if I had been in his shoes."

Sean restates his "no investment" policy:

"We haven't raised a dime since last August and we've said quite simply we will commercialize this is no way, we are not going to sell film rights or book rights whatever the latest scam theory on it is. We're sitting here like everybody else waiting for the results of the jury and we will do other things to try and support the premise that we've made -- understanding completely how ridiculous it sounds."

This means more than money to Sean:

"We have a technology, we're putting more than our money behind this. We're putting everything behind this, our reputation and everything behind it, because we believe. That doesn't mean that other people believe, but we do believe, and we do believe in the medium term that this technology will make it to market and that is what we are interested in. The rest is noise."

Sean's opinion on skeptics:

"We have to embrace the skepticism. But equally to understand, these are not intended to be slam dunk results, because they won't be. There will always be issues and rightfully so a simple demo, no matter how long it lasts, isn't proof of the claim. Proof of the claim is scientific analysis. But we are going to have to do other things as well. I won't go into details, but the biggest mistake that we've made and obviously we have to learn from our mistakes was to pre-announce the London demo. We've paid the price for that, we won't do it again. But we will be doing probably an awful lot more than we had intended. Basically when it happens we'll be letting people know. It will not be that far away."

Disappointed skeptics, people like Doctor Mike who we dragged half way around the world -- and all I can do is apologize to them and say look it didn't work, but we are going to do it again. It's not the end of the Steorn story.

34 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Sean McCarthy: "... I think the largest efficiency that *we would have physically measured* *would be* about 485%. These numbers can be misleading. For example *we might be getting* 485% per joule, ... but there *could be* a configuration that's *could be* delivering 130% efficiency ..."

Why all the hypothetical/conditional language? "We would have measured"? Meaning they didn't measure? (So that 485% is a pretty firm estimate, right? Right.)

Sean McCarthy: "We're putting everything behind this, ... because we *believe*. That doesn't mean that other people believe, but we do *believe* ..."

We're dealing with facts here. You either know it, or you don't. You don't "believe."

Sean McCarthy: "... these are not intended to be slam dunk results, because they won't be."

Good grief! One irrefutable demonstration of a true OU device will be a *slam dunk* Nobel prize (in the very next cycle), even if it's a fragile, unpractical, commericially worthless device (with no hope of ever being otherwise). That singular demonstration will yield them as much cash as they could ever dream of. Venture capitalists, conservative banks, and governments will be showering them with whatever they ask for, and more (starting with $1 million from James Randi).

I think the company has failed to build anything that is OU (or they would have shown us by now), and have put their plans in the hands of the "jury" and the clever hobbyists in the desparate hope that maybe one of those smart people can make it work (to which the company will say, "let me see what you did to make it work. .. Oh yes, that's *exactly* how we got it to work".

I think Orbo was a fake. A tiny motor driven by hidden batteries. It should be possible to spin a plastic disk with 15mW or a 2AH 1.2V battery for seven days fairly easy. A single AA size battery but in Li-Poly form...

A small high tech motor, perhaps a simple power controller, and a lithium film battery could be "hidden" in the form of the Orbo. It could not do any real "work" since the batteries have to be as small as possible. Just enough power to spin the disk for 7 days. Power consumption is proportional to speed so it probably ran slow to very slow.

I think the demo was actually aborted because Steorn was afraid the technical people would figure it out. If their demo was proven to be a battery powered fake, they would be super screwed!! They would probably end up in jail... Say the dog ate it, bearing failure, bad lighting,... "anything" is better than having it exposed as a fraud.

They probably meant to really show it at first, but they got cold feet when they looked at it and the level of people who would be seeing it. They would not let anyone near it since a very close inspection would reveal its true source of energy. From the few photos there are of it, the motor appears to be the fat section of the spindle in the center of the disk. The batteries could be film types that appear as a label or the opaque disk covering. Fake magnets or the odd "thing" in the front center are also possibilities. It could have also been powered by very tiny wires or clear conductive plastics or films.

Steorn will never let anyone get close to it. Any future demos will be behind windows or other difficult to access places just like Charles Redheffer did in 1813. This who thing is like 1813 all over again... Just another free energy investment scam. So far pretty successful, but it is falling apart fast now. Time for Steorn take the money and run!

"I think the company has failed to build anything that is OU (or they would have shown us by now), and have put their plans in the hands of the "jury" and the clever hobbyists in the desperate hope that maybe one of those smart people can make it work (to which the company will say, "let me see what you did to make it work. .. Oh yes, that's *exactly* how we got it to work"."

It seemed to me that mentioning Blaker's claimed 8 hour run was rather clutching at straws.

>I think the company has failed to build>anything that is OU (or they would have>shown us by now), and have put their plans>in the hands of the "jury" and the clever>hobbyists in the desparate hope that maybe>one of those smart people can make it work>(to which the company will say, "let me see>what you did to make it work. .. Oh yes,>that's *exactly* how we got it to work".

After reading Sean's bizarre interview, I'm thinking you may have hit the nail on the head.

One thing that is becoming clearer to me: Steorn has no "master plan", per se. I've read several posts by people who are puzzled as to Sean's motives and goals. I think simple desperation is the best explanation for what's happening.

Sean and perhaps one or two other guys started down this path because of some bad measurements and lack of understanding of basic electromagnetics. They were desperate to grab hold of something that could make them some money, because Steorn had been a financial disaster up to that point.

The Orbo saved Steorn from bankruptcy. No matter that it wasn't real; Sean "believed", and in turn he was able to make some investors believe. The problem is that Sean has long since crossed the line from delusion to fraud; because he knows that the Orbo can't be made self-running, no matter how hard he and his inner circle try. Given the numbers he's pulling out of the air, he may even be doubting his original measurements now.

So now Sean is randomly flailing about, telling the investors "real soon now", and distributing plans in the hope that someone, somewhere will show them how to make the Orbo do what they've claimed. There's no big payoff or master plan; Steorn is simply desperate to keep the show going, because the only alternative is financial ruin for Sean and the other principals.

"There's no big payoff or master plan; Steorn is simply desperate to keep the show going, because the only alternative is financial ruin for Sean and the other principals."

He has already had a spectacularly failed demo, and has promised another one. What excuse can he give for not holding the new demo? If he does not come across with it soon, the game will be over: the investors will sue, lodge a criminal complaint, etc.

If there is a successful demo, then all of the recent nasty accusations will be forgiven and we can start with new ones about hidden batteries.

I think anon/Tim makes a lot of sense. Assuming Steorn did discover an anomaly and wish to exploit it, they need to understand what it is and how it works to exploit it and create designs for practical devices. You can't licence IP on the basis of vague explanations, and a "sometimes works" example device.

So Steorn need scientific help to make money, but they couldn't get anyone to look at it. They can't go public with all the details, as they lose control of it. Trying to do a scientific investigation behind closed doors in the hope someone cracks it for them.

If they have no real plan, what they do does not have to make sense. The demo seemed a badly planned step, but that assumes there was logic behind it. Not putting a timescale on the jury also seems illogical. It does look like Sean is just stalling until the money runs out.

The Jury will of course get hands on with the test systems and the implementations of the technology. They also will receive the detailed papers that address method, apparatus etc of all the tests done to date with this method and other methods. We decided to put this method into the public domain in flash format so that the basic test concepts and methods can be described to a wider audience. Note that we will not be putting all the methods into flash at this time, just two key methods (lab analysis and device testing).

Thanks,

Sean

***

Hi Lance,

After we close down this thread we will distill it into a straight forward technical Q&A and remove the 'noise'.

I agree with the earlier comment about the hidden power source. One doesn't suddenly go from a questionable magnetic effect with the jury still empanelled to a "perpetual motion" machine in this manner. It is a fraud, and the statement that it ran for 3 hours "upstairs" at Kinetica is false. Whether the magnets in the device degrade over time or not, it would represent the first time in history that a wheel continuously spun without external energy. Does anyone really believe that the plexiglas contraption that Steorn's CEO held in his hand represented that moment in history? The demo was most likely rigged inside the opaque center on in the extra long magnet along the perimeter of the device and the CEO either couldn't get it to work or got cold feet, as the previous commentor stated. His explanation is not credible. They brought 3 machines and this one failed so, instead of substituting one of the other machines, they cannibalized them for bearings. No video was taken upstairs at Kinetica as the machine turned for 3 hours nor during the 10 days it or a similar device turned at Steorn's lab. The fact is that Steorn's CEO could have continued to capitalize upon this mysterious magnetic effect for another couple of years and drawn a hefty salary and benefits during that time. What made him take this fateful step and overplay his hand at Kinetica is unknown - perhaps internal pressure from the shareholders to prove what he had been telling them or others on the inside pushing him to up the ante on the claims to gain more attention and potential investment. Whatever the reason, it was a desperate move from a very desperate man. For those who are still convinced that this was an unfortunate demo that experienced technical difficulties and believe that the wheel turned at Kinetica for 3 hours upstairs, they would do better to shift their allegiance to the Perendev motor - it does run continuously, albeit with hidden batteries or other external energy. At least Perendev knows better than to schedule a live performance while soaking his investors.

Here's a thought: now that Kinetica has closed its doors at Spitalfields as of last Sunday, why didn't Sean use that as an excuse for his failed demo? He says he was forced to display because of a pre-announcement, but all I ever saw was a promise to display a demo some time in July which I naturally took to mean near the end of July. I never saw any pre-announcement, did anybody else? In fact I only read a rumor about Kinetica plus saw the leaked video of Sean smoking & chewing gum at the same time, like the day before.

Similarly, this excuse could also serve as the reason for not giving Dr. Mike any time with the demo unit; because they were in a rush to get the display built and operating for a 10 day run before the exhibit space shut down.

??Shrug?? Where else in the world can you display a perpetual motion machine except Kinetica Museum in London? Can't think of any other place that has that crucial mix of location, visibility, support, logistics, and bullshit tolerance.

Had to have a chuckle at the Steorn Forum this morning- Cranky's feelings were hurt by maryyugo's comments (comments made here)about her moderating. She had to ask her faithful minions how wonderful she is. They all obliged with telling her how gracious she is. Nobody specifically complimented her on her recent roasting of DrMike (it was all his fault we got no technical info out of the 'demo'- she did a much better job when she went to visit Steorn, etc...). Or her lambasting of HK who simply caught Sean in some of his lies (complete misinterpretation and misapplication of Neother's Theorem, anyone?). Or her general ability to allow the believers to say anything they like to anyone they like while banning the sceptical for suspicion of farting- but I'm sure they all feel a little warm and queasy inside after kissing her feet.

I know some here have good opinions of Crank- as an outside observer to Steorn's forum for six months or so I certainly cannot agree. The longer this (the Steorn comedy) goes on the more opportunity she has to lower my opinion of her- and she has yet to pass up an opportunity.

I'm sure the anonymous ramblings of an anonymous non-Steorn forum member mean absolutely nothing to her or anyone else. But I just about wanted to retch this morning after reading her whine thread. Now I've had mine.

"She had to ask her faithful minions how wonderful she is. They all obliged with telling her how gracious she is."

That's sad. That's like Crank walking into a room with a loaded gun, pointing it around, and asking "who doesn't like me" when everyone in the room knows you have killed without remorse or consequence before.

Regarding the Crank commentary, I could not agree more. I find Crank an even more insidious presence, however, because she is part and parcle of the Steorn scheme. Despite her protestations to the contrary, she is likely heavily involved with Steorn (whether professionally or socially) and herself a vested, fervent believer in the OU nonsense. The fact that she claims to be a neutral, fair "moderator" just turns my stomach. Her real objective is to protect Steorn's interests and public image at every turn in order to assist Steorn in perpetrating the fraud. She is just another cog in the Steorn BS marketing machine and should be treated with the utmost contempt.

This Crank-person claims she is a fence-sitter, but acts like a true believer.

There has never been any moderation in the forum. But suddenly it started - If you "torment" believers, you'll be banned. Woah! Up to demo it's been possible to say about anything with any tone, but when believers (Crank included) lose, then she starts cencoring.

You may call people shitheads and idiots, tell them to stick thumbs into ass, etc. but you MAY NOT remind believers what they have said prior demo. If you do, Crank punishes!!

I hope this Crank-person understands that she is a lousy moderator and decides to retire.

Well, for what it's worth, "Pennies" was banned some time before the July non-demo and so was I, supposedly because Magnatrix believed that I was Pennies!

The banning and censoring is sporadic, spotty, capricious and makes absolutely no sense. At least the psychic forums are consistent. They simply ban anyone who doesn't believe that their psychic is for real.

By the way, I have no way to know but it seems as if the moderators are not paid or hired by Steorn-- I think they are just volunteers who see their main job as protecting the faithful if not the faith.

I don't think my posts on the steorn fora were ever very rude or insulting. But I tend to write about publicly known, but sensitive information. I was originally banned for that from the Steorn forum. Last weeks all posts that have clearly my signature were removed within minutes.

NB If anybody really needs a Steorn account, give your e-mail address and I will give you one.

15 india street, thanks for the offer, but frankly what for. If any mod decide to ban me, and I feel I did not break any rule, then why should I take the effort to get another user name, just to be banned again for reason as spurious as they offer. I will simply concentrate myself here and on fizzx if this happen. I will miss Grant thread. A good way to have a good laugh, at somebody which read the bible, read the principle of christianty, and did not understand a word of it and what the meaning of those are .

As far as the Steorn forum is concerned, understand that it is "tool" of their's...

It is not to help "you". It is meant to help "them"! Expect anything negative or damning to be edited and/or manipulated at their pleasure. You will have to go to an independent forum if you want the unfiltered true story.

I have moderated forums for longer than I can remember and the moderators do have "total control" over every word that is posted (they can change what you say easily). For a controversial thing like this, I would not even bother playing "their game" on their forum. Once you get to be a negative to fulfilling their goal, you will be gone. Expect many "fake" personalities planted just to "sell" the product...

And I just have to say again, Steorn is a fraud and they are stealing investors money. They have shown nothing, they have nothing, and they can't even do a good fake Orbo. They have no technology. They have no patents and the patent "applications" they have will be rejected in due time. The only thing they have are lies and criminal fraud to bring in money. Three years later... They are just fishing for investment fools, and they still seem to be able to find them...

The only thing left for Steorn is this (cool if you have never heard the whole thing ;-))

I have been on the Steorn forum since almost the beginning and I have felt that the forum was a creation of Steorn to get a "feel" for how their con was going. Instant feedback. Conmen seem to survive longest by knowing exactly which buttons to press on their Mark. But to do that they need to see if the Mark is still in the game or is faltering. It is a "tell" of sorts using the Internet forum. If they see the Mark starting to resist they know it is time for some new material to keep the Mark's attention. In this case things like: Flash demos, pending patents, hints of 3rd party involvement, news of humane projects like the African pumps, the SPDC, the participation by Sean in the forum, the media interviews, and most recently the Kinetica demo.

These are things that have been traipsed out at intervals when Steorn felt the natives were getting restless and needed some invigoration.

For pyramid schemes to develop and work for example, the most important thing for the con artist is time. Pyramid or Ponzi schemes need a lot of time to build up to levels that prove profitable for the con artist for in the beginning of the process they are paying out to keep the initial investors plugged in by appealing to their greed.

While the Orbo thing is arguably perhaps not a pyramid scheme Steorn has established a built-in gimmick to create the stall. It is the jury selection followed by a long mysterious process to achieve a mythical validation day. Coupled with the numerous NDA's which preclude people from talking about anything for years, Steorn has created a couple of tools to help them buy time.

The SPDC was really to draw out the staunchest skeptics and sequester them under NDA but in fact, they will never be shown anything of value. The true believers who belong to the SPDC are just window dressing and can serve to spread the gospel for Steorn through their unbridled, starry-eyed enthusiasm. They will also receive nothing of value.

However, in my estimation for the con to have continued with vigor the demo had to work! It had to be just enough to calm the skeptics a tad (at least confuse them more) and really embrace the true believers who by then would be rabid and future bitter enders for Steorn.

Now considering that the 30 or so investors are believers (why would a skeptic drop a dime on this) who are looking to reap gigantic profits the inertia to believe is fueled by the fact that greed is blinding them.

of the laws as pertaining to fraud (otherwise on what basis can you declare something a fraud?) and to what extent there is room to play with, short of blatant criminality.

They also handled Intellectual Property projects for clients and boasted being a turnkey solution for other companies or inventors to help them realize their creations.

So you have some expertise in two crucial areas: intimate knowledge of how frauds operate and the process of getting an IP project off the ground.

They also had an insolvent company in 2005 and had to acquire new revenue streams if they were to survive. Hmmm, what to do, what to do?

Looking at options, Over Unity may have stood out as a possible avenue for a couple of reasons. First they know OU cannot be patented so they are safe there. They also know that most reputable scientist will not touch it with a ten foot pole and consider it to be a pseudoscience (what better way to keep the science cops off your tail?). They also know of the track record of many (all) OU claims in the past and present and how long these other OU ventures have managed to string things out without ever delivering what they promise. And their most striking feature: the science of it all is just murky enough to provide lots of slippery slopes that would-be debunkers would slide around on.

Free Energy is such a compelling cause no more so than in recent years with oil supplies diminishing, maxed out refining capacity and the price going higher and higher. So it has a very high attraction factor built in.

On this basis they could then develop their own OU scheme taking advantage of their past expertise and applying it to a pseudo-scientific field that is so murky and bizarre that hasn't fooled real scientists but could the naive "Rube," investor and groupie.

Scientists know that the universe provides no free lunch. Investors do not want to hear or think that otherwise why invest in the first place if the reward is not going to be there. The groupies truly want OU for the solution to our energy woes and because they are somewhat iconoclastic about classical science. The investors want to get stinking rich. And the skeptics? They are like ants at a picnic to Steorn - annoying but inevitable.

The first part of the above post was cut-off and here it is again complete:

____________________________

If Over Unity is achievable and that is a debate unto itself, then my instinct tells me it will not be done by a company like Steorn and certainly not in this manner. If it is a con though, then Steorn is a pretty good candidate.

They were in the fraud detection business. Ostensibly they have a lot of expertise in the workings of fraudsters. They know the good ones and the bad ones and why so. They are aware of the laws as pertaining to fraud (otherwise on what basis can you declare something a fraud?) and to what extent there is room to play with, short of blatant criminality.

They also handled Intellectual Property projects for clients and boasted being a turnkey solution for other companies or inventors to help them realize their creations.

So you have some expertise in two crucial areas: intimate knowledge of how frauds operate and the process of getting an IP project off the ground.

They also had an insolvent company in 2005 and had to acquire new revenue streams if they were to survive. Hmmm, what to do, what to do?

Looking at options, Over Unity may have stood out as a possible avenue for a couple of reasons. First they know OU cannot be patented so they are safe there. They also know that most reputable scientist will not touch it with a ten foot pole and consider it to be a pseudoscience (what better way to keep the science cops off your tail?). They also know of the track record of many (all) OU claims in the past and present and how long these other OU ventures have managed to string things out without ever delivering what they promise. And their most striking feature: the science of it all is just murky enough to provide lots of slippery slopes that would-be debunkers would slide around on.

Free Energy is such a compelling cause no more so than in recent years with oil supplies diminishing, maxed out refining capacity and the price going higher and higher. So it has a very high attraction factor built in.

On this basis they could then develop their own OU scheme taking advantage of their past expertise and applying it to a pseudo-scientific field that is so murky and bizarre that hasn't fooled real scientists but could the naive "Rube," investor and groupie.

Scientists know that the universe provides no free lunch. Investors do not want to hear or think that otherwise why invest in the first place if the reward is not going to be there. The groupies truly want OU for the solution to our energy woes and because they are somewhat iconoclastic about classical science. The investors want to get stinking rich. And the skeptics? They are like ants at a picnic to Steorn - annoying but inevitable.

Of course, that thread I created represents the first time I've ever posted over there. Crank's a nutter, in my estimation.

To be fair, I e-mailed the other moderator, and he/she told me that I could create a new account and it would be approved. Pfffpth. Whatever. Not worth the trouble. The signal-to-noise ratio is much better over here anyway.

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